Buy: Vegan Cheddar Puffs

Vegan Cheddar Puffs


Made with all-natural water lily seeds, organic extra virgin coconut oil, nutritional yeast, sea salt and paprika, Lily Puffs taste like a healthier version of cheese puffs—but with no actual cheese. With no sugar, these are a crunchy snack that satisfy……

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Highlights from Clerkenwell Design Week 2018: Remarkable installations on display across London's nightclubs, churches, former prisons and more

Highlights from Clerkenwell Design Week 2018


In the crowded space of global design weeks, London’s Clerkenwell Design Week has a distinct advantage: not only is the area home to a huge number of architects and design businesses, making it a truly local celebration, it’s also blessed with interesting……

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Competition: win a book exploring Mies van der Rohe's unrealised Mansion House Square

For our latest competition, Dezeen is giving away three copies of Mies in London – a publication documenting architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe‘s unbuilt Mansion House Square scheme.

Mies in London by REAL

Mies in London is a 160-page hardback book published by REAL (Real Estate Architecture Laboratory), a cultural institute and publisher founded by Jack Self, that aims to offer a glimpse into Mies van der Rohe’s unrealised office block in London.

Commissioned for the City of London in 1962, the 19-storey-high, amber-glass tower would have been Mies’ only building in the UK were it not thwarted by a campaign against it and eventually dropped in 1984.

Mies in London by REAL

For Mies in London, REAL has pulled together archival material, including drawings, model photographs and collages, as well as letters written by the architect, sourced from institutions and private collections, such as RIBA, the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) and Drawing Matter.

These images take up full pages throughout the book, with short descriptive captions placed underneath.

“Mies in London is REAL’s longest-running and most complex project to date, taking three years in as many continents,” said Self, who edited the book alongside Yulia Rudenko.

“No expense was spared in making one of the most comprehensive projects about any of Mies’ works,” he added.

Mies in London by REAL

London-based studio OK-RM designed the bronze cover of the book as a reference to Mies’ design. Black imprints of the ashtray and door handle that the architect had produced for the tower are then laid over the top.

REAL has also worked with ironmongery designer Ize to produce a limited run of these two products to mark the release.

Mies in London by REAL

Mies van der Rohe’s Mansion House Square was also the subject of an exhibition at the Royal Institute of British Architects last year. The building was under development for more than 20 years, before it was abandoned following a long campaign by Prince Charles.

Mies in London is also available to purchase online for £70.

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Competition closes 20 June 2018. Three winners will be selected at random and notified by email, and their names will be published at the top of this page.

Photography is by Mies in London, courtesy of REAL.

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Algorithms could reduce taxi numbers by half, says Carlo Ratti

Cities would need half as many taxis if human drivers were replaced with robots, according to new research coordinated by Carlo Ratti, director of MIT’s Senseable City Lab.

Autonomous vehicles guided by algorithms could complete the same number of journeys with half the vehicles, the research finds.

However self-driving taxis could eventually lead to “surreal gridlock” as passengers abandon public transport for the superior service provided by autonomous vehicles, Ratti warned.

The research finds that taxis in urban areas could be deployed with much greater efficiency if routes are optimised and ride-sharing opportunities facilitated through technology.

Human drivers would be more efficient if guided by algorithms 

Even if human vehicle operators were retained, cities would need 30 per cent fewer vehicles if routes were decided by algorithms rather than by drivers.

“The implications for big cities is that even with today’s driving technology it is possible to dramatically improve efficiency of taxi systems by changing the way they are managed,” Ratti told Dezeen.

“For this to happen, however, the business model on which taxis are currently operated — which is essentially 400 years old — should be transformed into a centrally operated and intelligent one.”

However better technology may not reduce congestion in cities, as the introduction of shared autonomous vehicles is expected to increase the demand for taxi services.

Driverless cars could increase congestion as people flock to use them

“One of the predicted effects of shared autonomous vehicles is an increase in vehicular travel demand,” Ratti said.

The statement echoes a claim by transportation designer Paul Priestman, who earlier this year told Dezeen that autonomous vehicles could lead to bigger traffic jams.

“There’s a lot of talk about autonomous vehicles, but my view is that until they all start communicating seamlessly together, you’re just going to get traffic jams full of autonomous vehicles with nobody in them as they go to pick up other people,” Priestman said.

“It’s going to exacerbate the situation rather than improve it,” he continued.

Ratti, who heads architecture studio Carlo Ratti Associati as well as directing the Senseable City Lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, spoke to Dezeen as science journal Nature published a research paper by a group of researchers headed by Ratti.

Ratti solves “minimum fleet” problem

The paper claims to solve the “minimum fleet” problem by producing a mathematical model to calculate the minimum number of vehicles required to provide the mobility requirements of a city.

Focusing on New York, the team looked at data from 150 million journeys and calculated that the city would require 9,450 taxis instead of the current fleet of 13,500 to provide the current demand of 500,000 trips per day, if the routes were planned by artificial intelligence.

“New York would need 30 per cent fewer vehicles if the taxi fleet, even with human drivers, is managed better,” Ratti said. “Essentially, what is required is simply better algorithms.”

Taxi numbers could fall by half

“If we were to look at a fully autonomous city, the reduction in vehicles would be closer to 50 per cent,” he added.

However autonomous taxis would create additional demand and draw users away from other transport solutions, Ratti said.

“Problems might arise from what one could call the ‘unfair competitive advantage’ of vehicle autonomy,” he explained.

“The cost of traveling a mile might drop so substantially that people would abandon public transportation in favor of autonomous cars. That, in turn, could lead to an increase in the number of vehicles in a city—and with that increase, surreal gridlock.”

Robot taxis could lead to “surreal gridlock”

But he said: “However, our study clearly shows the immense potential of optimising vehicle fleet size and management for improving efficiency, and, ultimately, reduce congestion even in presence of a predicted increase in travel demand.”

Even though Ratti and his team looked specifically at Manhattan, he said the predicted efficiency gains could be expected in other large, dense cities.

“We can reasonably assume that similar figures would apply to other big cities,” he said.

Mobility sharing is only effective in dense urban areas

“As for smaller cities, additional studies are required,” Ratti added. “I would expect that the same would apply up to a certain point, but then decrease when density becomes too low [as] opportunities for mobility sharing closely depend on the density of trip demand, which is expected to be lower in less dense cities.”

The “minimum fleet” problem has stumped scientists for years, meaning that city authorities and fleet providers alike have been unable to calculate the optimum number of vehicles required to provide an efficient service.

Now Ratti and his team claim to have solved the problem. Their mathematical model, published in Nature today under the heading Addressing the minimum fleet problem in on-demand urban mobility, assumes that vehicle routes are assigned by algorithms rather than humans.

“It shows that tomorrow’s urban problems regarding mobility can be tackled not necessarily with more physical infrastructure but with more intelligence,” Ratti said. “In other words: with more silicon, and less asphalt.”

The research team included Mohammad Vazifeh of the SENSEable Senseable City Lab; Giovanni Resta, a researcher at IIT-CNR; Steven Strogatz, professor of mathematics at Cornell University; and Paolo Santi, research scientist at the Senseable City Lab and senior researcher at the Italian National Research Council CNR, who who lead the research team.

Researchers will study parking spaces next

“If we were to consider replacing the current taxi system in New York with an optimized fleet of vehicles, we would have to find the best way of serving the around 500,000 trips made in a day, which are currently served by about 13,500 taxis,” said Santi.

The team will next look for a mathematical model to calculate the minimum number of parking spaces required in a city.

MIT’s Senseable City Lab explores how technology will impact cities and they way people live in them. MIT was ranked at number 77 in the latest Dezeen Hot List of the most newsworthy forces in design, while Carlo Ratti Associati was ranked at 300. Ratti is also a judge for Dezeen Awards 2018.

The post Algorithms could reduce taxi numbers by half, says Carlo Ratti appeared first on Dezeen.

Beautiful Monumental Installation for We Love Green Festival

We Love Green marque, tous les ans le début de la saison des festivals estivaux. Cette année le programme sera de nouveau alléchant dans l’antre du Bois de Vincennes les 2 et 3 juin prochain. Des têtes d’affiches telles que Björk, Orelsan, Juliette Armanet, Jamie XX, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Beck, Angèle, Lomepal, Sampha, Ibeyi ou encore Nina Kravitz défileront sur les différentes scènes. Les concerts sont comme à chaque éditions complétés par des happenings et conférences.

Un autre élément majeur du festival réside dans la présentation d’une oeuvre artistique signature, spécialement conçue pour l’évènement, élue en avril dernier par un jury dont Fubiz faisait partie, entouré de Jean de Loisy, président du Palais de Tokyo et parrain du jury, l’architecte Grégory Chapuisat, la designer Constance Guisset, l’artiste Jean-Marie Appriou et les scénographes Eléonore Doisy et Etienne Vilotte du studio Épatants.

La création Nouveau Monde imaginée par l’agence Stavy Architectes, a été choisie parmi plus de 200 candidatures pour être présentée durant cette huitième édition de We Love Green.
Stavy Architectes est une agence pluridisciplinaire, qui imagine des oeuvres et nourrissent l’imaginaire dans le domaine de l’architecture, de l’urbanisme ou encore de la scénographie. La thématique de l’écologie est au centre des préoccupations des créatifs. C’est le cas de l’oeuvre sélectionnée par le jury de We Love Green.

Le Nouveau Monde est une installation composée de 3500 écailles conçues à partir d’une résille élaborée à l’aide déchets plastiques prélevés dans la nature et les océans.
La forme de la création, qui rappelle celle d’un coquillage trouvé au fond de l’océan, incite à l’échange et aux rencontres. Six portails accueillent les visiteurs, qui peuvent ainsi se réunir au centre sous un dôme.

Une création, qui reste fidèle à la thématique de We Love Green : consommer durable dans un souci d’écologie et de préservation de l’environnement.

Rendez-vous les 2 et 3 juin prochain au Bois de Vincennes pour venir contempler ce magnifique Nouveau Monde au rythme des différents styles musicaux des artistes qui seront à l’affiche.

Infos et réservations sur www.welovegreen.fr

Design Job: Develop Global Home & Health Products as an Industrial Designer at Helen of Troy

This is a global position supporting all regions of the organization. Industrial Design plays a key role in strategic pipeline definition, consumer insight research and creative direction, management and execution of all new product launch initiatives.

View the full design job here

The CLiP System for Carrying Small Objects and Keeping Them Organized

This is one of those “not for me, but I can see how this is useful” products. The CLiP System, designed by South-Carolina-based design/engineering firm Lever Gear, was created for those who need to carry small items around–flash drives, meds, SD cards, et cetera–and compensates for the inherently poor UX that comes with trying to access tiny objects. Take a look:

The flat form factor seems so much more user-friendly than the standard cylinder. I also like the carabiner functionality, the removable belt clip and particularly the flashlight on the BitLight version. Mike Scully, the industrial designer and mechanical engineer behind Lever Gear, appears to have really thought this object through.

I’m often interested in where people’s ideas come from, and the genesis of this project is printed on its Kickstarter page:

A few years ago, Lever Gear founder, Mike Scully, injured his back. It was not good. Around that time he also had his teeth straightened, which was good, except he now got spinach stuck in his teeth at every meal. (And he doesn’t eat much spinach.) Those two problems meant he was carrying around small pills and toothpicks all day. Not a big deal except the toothpicks ended up covered in pocket lint and the pills sometimes went through the wash.

As fate would have it, he had been working on an idea for an EDC pocket screwdriver that stored bits in a slide out drawer. It dawned on him that he could store any small items in his pocket driver. Or was it that he could add a hex bit socket to his pillbox? Either way, anytime he can combine tools to carry less, he’s all for it.

That’s when the real work began. Now that we had a product concept, we had even more questions. How could we add even more functionality? How could we make it easy to carry? What other tools could we create using the same form and even the same parts? What accessories can we create to enhance the design?

We spent nearly two years in development because we were designing a system of tools. In fact, the BitVault and BitLight are just the beginning of the story. With your help, we can write the rest.

The campaign has already been successfully funded, with $24,967 in pledges on a $16,000 goal. At press time there were still 36 days left to pledge.

Steven M. Johnson's Bizarre Invention #108: New Vista Bikes

Matt Fajkus creates office addition for mid-century Austin home

Texas studio Matt Fajkus Architecture used wood, stucco and glass to form an extension to a 1960s dwelling on a sloped site overlooking a creek.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

The project, called Creekbluff Studio, entailed adding a spacious office to a mid-century-modern home that is owned by clients who work in the financial sector. The 1966 house, which is clad in wood and stone, is located on a hilly, one-acre site in Austin‘s Bull Creek neighbourhood. The expansion was designed to complement the main dwelling and to capitalise on the scenic terrain.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

“The home office addition not only complements the existing house and balances the dynamic west Austin lot, but also created a newly framed portal to an adjacent creek and a rich landscape beyond,” said local studio Matt Fajkus Architecture, also known as MF Architecture.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

Encompassing 1,000 square feet (93 square metres), the addition is designed to house up to five employees. Roughly L-shaped in plan, the extension contains two offices, a conference room, a studio, a bathroom and storage space. A glazed box links the extension to the main house.

“A glass entry connects the new to the existing, offering a clear view of and direct access to the unique natural beauty of the site,” the team said in a statement.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

Topped with a pitched metal roof, the addition is wrapped in wood and stucco. For the street-facing elevation, the team created an opaque facade in order to provide a heightened level of privacy. A portion of the facade pushes outward, allowing for the addition of side windows.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

“By offsetting the wood panel portion of the front wall, the office is able to harvest daylight through side windows that are hidden from the street view,” Matt Fajkus Architecture said.

In the rear, the team created a wooden deck that is lifted off the ground by concrete piers and is shaded by a roof overhang. Unlike the solid front facade, the back elevation is highly transparent.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

“The back side of the home office opens up to the outdoors with large windows, floor-to-ceiling glass sliding doors, and a patio tucked between tree canopies overlooking the creek,” the studio said.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

A restrained approach was used for the interior design. Rooms feature concrete flooring, white walls and contemporary decor. In several areas, the ceiling is sheathed in a rich-toned wood that was also used for the building’s soffits.

Creekbluff Studio by Matt Fajkus Architecture

“Wood ceilings extend out, further strengthening the indoor and outdoor connection,” said the studio.

Matt Fajkus Architecture has included a number of projects in its home state of Texas, including a two-storey residence organised around an old oak tree and an asymmetric home that contains a large garage to house vintage cars.

Photography is by Charles Davis Smith.

Project credits:

Architect: Matt Fajkus Architecture
Design team: David Birt, Matt Fajkus
General contractor: A R Lucas Construction Company
Photography logistic support: Nitsche Events
Windows and doors: Milgard
Interior pocket door: The Sliding Door Company
Entry doors: Hoelscher
Bathroom tile: Anatolia

The post Matt Fajkus creates office addition for mid-century Austin home appeared first on Dezeen.

Dezeen and GDPR

If you’re not already bored to death of news about GDPR, read on for details of our policies and for an explanation of how we use data provided by our readers, subscribers and clients.

The good news is we won’t be sending you irritating emails asking you to confirm your subscription! Instead, Dezeen has been working behind the scenes over the past few months to ensure we are compliant with the European Union’s new data-protection regulations, known in the UK as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

In preparation for GDPR we have completed a full audit of our data collection and retention activities and have published a detailed privacy notice, which can be found here: www.dezeen.com/privacy-notice.

The information below is intended as a more user-friendly guide to our data practices but please refer to the privacy notice for more detailed information.

Dezeen has always had a policy of collecting the least amount of data necessary, and to seek consent. We never have and never will pass on any details of any visitor, subscriber or customer to anyone else without their explicit consent.

Website visitors

The only data collected from visitors to our websites is via cookies, as set out in our cookies policy. The only time we collect personal data is when a visitor opens a user account for one of our services, or when they become a newsletter subscriber.

User accounts

Users need to create accounts in order to use certain services provided by Dezeen. These are Dezeen Jobs advertiser accounts, which allow firms to publish job ads on www.dezeenjobs.com; and Dezeen Jobs jobseeker accounts, which allow jobseekers to apply for jobs via the platform.

Individuals and companies wishing to enter Dezeen Awards  also need to open an account.

In all the above cases we only collect the data we need to provide you with the relevant service requested. You can close your account and request that your data is permanently removed at any time by emailing privacy@dezeen.com, but please be aware that this will mean you will no longer be able to advertise or apply for jobs on Dezeen Jobs, or continue your participation in Dezeen Awards.

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If we invite you to an event via a newsletter we will sometimes direct you to a third-party RSVP service. We will make it clear when this is the case.

All newsletter subscribers can unsubscribe instantly and permanently by clicking the “Unsubscribe” link at the bottom of every newsletter we send. Note that in some instances clicking “Unsubscribe” will only unsubscribe them from the particular newsletter they click the link in. If you want us to permanently remove you from all our newsletter databases, or require further information about the lists you are subscribed to, please email us at privacy@dezeen.com.

Our newsletters lists and campaigns are hosted by and sent by Campaign Monitor. You can read about their GDPR policies here.

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We collect data about people who enter our competitions in order to be able to send them a prize if they win.

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That’s it

Thanks for listening! And in case you missed it, our privacy notice can be found here: www.dezeen.com/privacy-notice

The post Dezeen and GDPR appeared first on Dezeen.